Authorities burn P77M worth of illegal drugs 

Illegal drugs worth P77 million are being readied to be burned inside an incinerator of a funeral home in Cebu City on October 13, 2020. | CDN Digital – Alven Marie A Timtim

CEBU CITY, Philippines — A total of 12,157.43 grams of shabu, marijuana and other expired medicines were destroyed through thermal destruction this morning, October 13, 2020, at the crematorium office of the Cosmopolitan Funeral Homes, along Junquera Street, Cebu City.

The illegal drugs have an estimated value of P77 million while the expired medicines from licensed pharmaceutical companies were worth P1.9 million.

Heads of Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency in Central Visayas (PDEA-7) together with the Police Regional Office in Central Visayas (PRO-7) and some local government representatives were present during the disposal of the illegal drugs.

PDEA-7 Director Levi Ortiz said that the destroyed illegal drugs were those that had been approved by the court for destruction either because the cases had been already solved or the judge had allowed the destruction of the illegal drugs despite those cases that were still ongoing.

“As much as we like to destroy all evidence, but we cannot do so because wala pa man (there is no) court order … we cannot just burn evidence. Magpa abot pa ta og (We have to wait for a) court order para sunogon ang ebidensiya (so that we can burn the evidence),” said Ortiz. 

The illegal drugs, which were destroyed or disposed of, were those confiscated in the police and PDEA-7 operations in Metro Cebu.

Read: Cebu City: Promised incinerators for PDEA-7 are on the way

Police Brigadier General Albert Ignatius Ferro, director of PRO-7, said that they had been coordinating with the courts to be able to monitor decision of cases so the police could attain the court order and be able to forward it to PDEA-7 for the process of the destruction.

“We are coordinating with the different courts so that we can fast-track ang ilahang decision and makahatag sila og court order unya atong ihatag sa PDEA kay sila man ang the ultimate agency to handle the destruction,” said Ferro.

(We are coordinating with the different courts so that we can fast-track their decision and they can give a court order that we can forward to PDEA because they are the ultimate agency to handle the destruction.)

According to Ferro, the Police Regional Crime Laboratory of Central Visayas supervised by Police Colonel Roderick Pausal, also has illegal drugs, which are evidence that are kept in the facility for inventory and are about to be turned over to the PDEA-7 facility for the next scheduled destruction of illegal drugs.

https://www.facebook.com/cdndigital/videos/1308533292820233

Before the illegal drugs were destroyed, the PDEA-7 chemists showed the testing process of verifying the authenticity of the illegal drugs. 

The chemists said that the dark blue samples of the chemicals mixed with the illegal drug were proof of the presence of  marijuana, and when the chemicals when mixed with the illegal drugs would turn deep violet, these would mean that the drugs mixed with the chemicals were shabu./dbs